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AFGHAN RESETTLEMENT — While plenty of communities are preparing for the arrival of Afghan evacuees, the actual resettlement flow has yet to build. The New York Times’ Miriam Jordan and Jennifer Steinhauer report that some 53,000 Afghans are currently living on military bases across the country and another 14,000 are awaiting transfer to the U.S. from bases abroad. A combination of vaccination efforts, quarantines, immigration processing and a shortage of housing is causing the delay in community resettlement. Still, there’s hope: Abdulhadi Pageman, a former Afghan Air Force pilot, said of the families waiting to resettle: "These children are the future of the United States. They will be scientists, engineers. You just have to be patient." In related news, the Times’ Madeleine Ngo highlights the Vietnamese Americans who empathize with the Afghans’ plight and are mobilizing to help. JOB CREATION — ICYMI: Amazon, Facebook, Pfizer and Chobani are among a group of major companies collaborating with the Tent Coalition for Afghan Refugees "to generate jobs and provide training and other resources" for Afghan evacuees, as Paola Peralta reports for Employment Benefit News. Here’s today’s list of local welcome stories:
HONEYBEE EXPERT — Troy Kinsey of Bay News 9 tells the story of Worrel Diedrick, a Jamaican-born entomologist "known for his paradigm-shifting research on honeybee health" who applied to the National Interest Waiver program to secure a green card for specialized work. As Kinsey notes, "the program allows undocumented immigrants with advanced degrees who are engaged in endeavors of ‘substantial merit and national importance’" to bypass the substantial green card backlog. Farmworkers "need the honeybee — they’ll pay big bucks to get honeybees, and right now honeybees are on the decline when we need them the most," Diedrick explained on a tour of the North Florida research farm where he works. The Council on National Security and Immigration’s (CNSI) latest paper speaks to the need for high-skilled immigration in maintaining the country’s global competitiveness. CHILDREN OF THE CIRCUIT— In a powerful interactive piece for The Washington Post, Kevin Sieff tells the story of 17-year-old Antonio, "one of the most prolific juvenile smugglers along a section of the border that’s full of them." Many of these young smugglers are boys who grew up near the U.S.-Mexico border, Sieff writes, and they earn about $100 for each migrant they get across the Rio Grande. "For many, it’s a part-time job, a hole in the border economy that they can fill." Because the U.S. Department of Justice cannot prosecute Mexican minors for smuggling migrants, they continue to work the system, he adds. Known as "Niños de circuito," or ‘children of the circuit,’ young smugglers like Antonio have two options as their 18 birthday approaches: continue doing dangerous cartel work or work toward a high school diploma via a government program. Read this story to the end. Thanks for reading, Ali |
